Senator McCaskill hopes President Obama gets specific in his healthcare address to Congress tonight. She says the Senate is working on a bill that can move forward with bipartisan support.
McCaskill says health insurance cost increases have "gobbled up" raises that many Missourians have received each year for several years. She says that situation will continue if Congress does nothing.
McCaskill expects President Obama’s speech tonight to set the tone for debate to come on healthcare. She’s looking for some specifics from him. She says he feels strongly that Congress needs to escape "the partisan games that always develop when we 0do things that are difficult."
McCaskill says Congress has a tendency to focus on "political advantage" instead of focusing on solving problems. She says it is obvious a lot of misinformation is being circulated. She hopes the speech tonight clears up the "errors" that are common in the discussion.
She says people are not sure what the reform means to them, which opens the door to fear and misinformation. McCaskill says the President needs to get the public acquainted with how changes will affect it. "People need those answers because if they don’t have them, then they’re just going to assume all the silly stuff they’re hearing out there must be true," she says. She thinks it is incumbent upon Obama to provide more specifics to his plan.